WHAT’S IN A FACE?
IN CONTEMPORARY ART PHOTOGRAPHY… • People are often photographed in a
uniformed way, centrally in the picture, facing the camera and looking into the lens.
• Any variability in the picture is mostly
due to differences in the subject
• This kind of portraiture is visually like
ethnographic photography - of colonised people in controlled situations
THOMAS RUFF
Some further examples of ethnographic style photos...
CELINE VAN BALEN
JITKA HANZLOVA
MARIE-JO LAFONTAINE
WHAT IS ETHNOGRAPHIC PHOTOGRAPHY • Ethnographic photography is a term used to describe the broad range of
photography of people. For example photojournalism, documentary and portraiture.
• It has come under some critique due to it's links with surveillance, class and
control.
• It has been thought that this may also link to Neoliberalism, a political
movement that focuses on social and economical ideas.
• However, the photographs that fit into the ethnographic category could be
said to depict subjects who are not any different from the viewers.
• Thus highlighting the differences of identity in the world.
• An objective manor of viewing makes qualities such as lyricism and overt
identification with the subject disused to the photographer.
• Lyricism is a quality in the photograph that expresses deep feelings or
emotions in the work.
• The sitters awareness of the camera is the main theme of a portrait. It is
recognised by the way the subjects eyes meet the lens.
• Photographers Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin demonstrated the
importance of this with their group of images where none of the subjects are looking directly into the camera, creating a distance between them and the viewer. Making them wonder why they are not aware they are being photographed and what they are doing.
Adam Broomberg and Oliver Chanarin show the importance of the subject looking at the lens. Series ‘Trust’ (2000)
STEREOTYPE AND PERCEPTION
• Looking at other factors other than the face; surroundings, dress,
positioning of person, what they are doing - can the face only say so much about a person?
• FASHION: destructs the aura of the face; more about the clothes than the
face. However, the face becomes important when it is already identifiable ie. a celebrity.
CAMERA TECHNIQUES • Rineke Dijkstra presents her subjects in a standardised frame - she uses a
5x4 camera for fine detail and subtle colour.
• Depending on the position of the camera, certain compositions allow
different perception of subject. In her work her camera is a waist level, ‘dropping the horizon line and lending the figures greater stature’ concentrating on the whole body rather than just the face.
• Her technique of tripod-mounted fill-in flash makes the figures appear ‘cut-
out’, enhancing their physical presence within the frame.
• Composition and style reflects the uniqueness of
the sitter. This appears in works from such artists like Nan Goldin and Larry Clark, who photographed the people in their lives.
DIJKSTRAS WORK STEMS FROM... • the work of Sander, the Bechers and Ruff. It has roots in radical ethnography. • Her work is also close to fashion and magazine work such as Penn, Arbus and
Avedon. • It relates to documentary style, particularly Walker Evans (because of their
shared obsession with head on views and clarity).
‘THE EFFORT IT TOOK ON MY PART WAS CONSIDERABLE…’ PENN • Penn selects subjects and arranges them
how he wishes. He manipulated bodies to create the compositions he wanted - allowing no room for self expression.
• Like Avedon he published photographs of
these ‘labour workers’ to show to an audience of ‘urban cosmopolitan types’
• Rohrbach said that Avedon put the matter of ‘difference’ plainly between
the classes • He said the subjects are ‘… people whom many of us would prefer to step
quietly around if encountered in life’
• Fashion photographers wanted to broaden their portraiture.
Therefore they moved away from the glitz and glamour of fame and moved to more realistic subjects. • Irving Penn photographed different “stereotypes” in his
project 'Worlds in a Small Room'. He used different people's styles, for example bikers, hippies and lorry washers, to show a more real side of portraiture. • His images showed “real” people have a uneasiness and
self conscious approach to the camera. He notes that positioning them to get the perfect image took great effort.
• However Dijkstra, unlike Penn and Avedon, chooses but does not pose her
subjects. Therefore she has no control over how the image will turn out and relies solely on the subject to create the link between the image and the viewer. •
This therefore provides and identification “silence” between the subject and viewer with only the subjects body language and facial expression telling a story. Providing a link to fashion photography as a story is “written on the skin.”
AVEDON • Avedon's work was made with an
awareness of Arbus and Sander
• He used white paper backgrounds with
no sunlight (unlike Penn)
• He printed the edges of negatives to
show the picture had not been cropped
• Avedon used a 8x10 camera which he stood
next to, keeping eye contact with his subjects. This was at the expense of precise framing. • Some of the pictures harshly crop the
subjects - although this looks deliberate • The placing of people creates expressive
effect, e.g. off kilter suggesting social and mental instability.
Avedon looked for subjects that he thought could ‘hold a [museum] wall’
TECHNOLOGY • Photographic resolution: considerable improvement of film resolution
between the 60s and the present day
• Dijkstra’s use of large format produced good quality photographs, but had
limitations; people ‘pose quietly’ and are not allowed any ‘spontaneous activity’ - this means models are static and are not free to self express capturing what the photographer wants/needs from you
• Through lights, post-production and the photographer’s view, an idealised
persona is created. We are not seeing the ‘true person’, but somebody merely acting the desired view of what the photographer wants to capture
• LINKS TO: Dijkstra talking about viewing her photographs as self portraits
• Displaying large amounts of
data in images such as Dijkstras may be related to a trend in contemporary art photography to exploit the ‘data sublime’
• Due to their size the photos
overwhelm the viewer.
An exhibition of Dijkstras work, showing the scale
• Thomas Ruff’s large scale portraits
deny social differentiation and “abandon the viewer in a wilderness of information.”
• The subjects in these ethnographic
photos do not act or interact. References in this practice are made to fashion, avant-garde objectivity and neo-objective art photography.
• In contrast to work such as Dijkstras,
documentary and photojournalism, such as the work of W. Eugene Smith and Sebastiao Salgado, is assumed (by the art world) to be an expression of social naivetĂŠ and cultural simplicity
• In ethnographic photos the subjects
must not be seen as interacting social agents • Self presentation is the only variable
allowed • Self presentation becomes a theme
in Dijkstra’s beach photos, we can see the variations in how the teenagers from Poland and the USA present themselves Poland
United States
This theme of self presentation is shown in her photos of Almerisa, an exiled child who is photographed over several years. The photos show how she grows into the clothing and body language of her adopted culture.
19942002
• Images contain a lot of data, however, they are lacking in specific material
for a single interpretation, causing them to move back and forth from different meanings. Instead, we find portraits give away more about the photographer than the subject.
• Dijkstra claims the beach portraits are “more or less a self portrait.”
Therefore leaving the viewer to an even broader range of interpritations.
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=solM3-7dlps
• Ethnography has been used for many years to capture
the lives of the different social classes. Probably the most noted documentation of the classes are images from photographers such as David Octavius Hill who captured the rise of the middle class.
• These bourgeois images show the innocence of the
middle class who were not used to being photographed as it was mainly a medium for the upper classes.
• These images not only show the rise of the middle class,
but the advancement of photographic technology.
• German philosopher Walter Benjamin once described photography as a
chance for the sitter to reflect on their lives. Therefore he argued the images portray the rise of a confident rising class. • However, the advancement in technology has opposed Benjamin's writing
as the sitter cannot take time to reflect on their lives, causing the insinuation that portraiture has travelled into more trivial subjects.
• If poses are familiar, it is because ‘capitalist
subjects are schooled in uniform disciplines of self presentation’ • For example, the passport photo - guidelines
and uniformity - every one has to be the same. • People notice their flaws more as they have to
conform to certain guidelines - so when seeing a ‘perfect’ image, they strive to be ‘icons of capitalist beauty’.
• So, being photographed in such a standardised way gives the viewer very
little information about the person. They are seemed as ‘other’ and their ‘instability of identity is fixed upon’. • For example, having a photo against a plain background, compared to in a
personal space
• PAGE 12: GOOD QUOTE! By Dijkstra • ‘no one can completely understand someone else’ - while the subject
remains solitary, we also have a connection with them. • Dijkstra wanted to get the ‘essential human’ out of her subjects, by
‘stripping away the social’ - showing we are all the same, yet she presents the subject in a way that she wishes, putting her own ‘twist’ on their physical presence.
• There is an old discredited notion that primitives, women and lower classes
had greater affinity with their bodies - seen written in their true character. • Even now, in photos not everyone appears rational. This is particularly true
of the young, especially adolescents.
• These subjects have become passive reflectors. In neoliberal society there
is a difficulty knowing who is really “the other” due to several factors including continual social upheaval. • As images, we participate in a chain tying peoples appearances to
exchange value. • The photos describe a world in which people are socially small, politically
weak and are governed by their place in the image world. By demanding the maximum visual detail from their subjects they silence and still them.
• Photography can provide a sense of power - people are easily available to
look at your portrait - where you may be overlooked in real life, appearing powerless • QUOTE PG15: ‘a portrait photographer depends upon another person to
complete his picture’…..
• Overall, the photographer has the power to embed their identity on the
photograph - embedding their ‘fiction’ on another person to portray
• ‘The subject imagined must be discovered in someone else willing to take
part in the fiction he cannot possibly know about…. but the control is with me’ - are we really presented as us, or are we just projecting another’s story?
• SELFIES? - the big debate!